Anne Barbour (16 page)

In the corridor between acts, Tally strolled with Cat and Richard past the boxes of friends and acquaintances. Cat was enjoying herself immensely, taking part in the lively discussions that were taking place concerning
Town Bronze
.

“Do you not think that Branwell Shovelsnuff is Petersham?” she was saying to the Duchess of Bedford. “After all, who else is so obsessed with that unpleasant habit?”

The Duchess laughed.

“If it were not obviously he from the description given in the book, his portrait in the illustration would certainly give him away.”

Richard glanced at Tally and rolled his eyes toward the ceiling. Tally watched, smiling, as he fell behind to chat with Lord Whittaker, his superior at the Foreign Office. She noticed Clea Bellewood standing close by, and in a moment, when Lord Whittaker had turned away, she approached Richard, bumping into him as though by accident.

Under Tally’s indignant gaze, Clea proceeded to bestow upon Richard the full treatment, complete with waving eyelashes and beguiling smile. Tally could not hear their talk, but it became apparent that Lady Belle was well on the way to another conquest. Walk away, Richard! she fairly shouted inside her head. Just turn away, and leave!

But Richard did not leave. Instead, he remained in rapt conversation with Clea for several minutes before recalling himself to his obligations, upon which, he lightly kissed Lady Belle’s fingertips and hurried off to Cat, who was by now at the other end of the corridor.

Tally simply stood, rooted to the carpet. Her mind raced. Surely Richard was not inclined to embark on a flirtation with Clea. Had he not made it clear in the alcove off Lady Talgarth’s ballroom that he was not interested in any woman other than his wife?

She gave herself a little shake. She was making too much of what she had seen. If Richard chose to play the gallant for a few minutes to a lovely woman, that did not mean he intended to betray his wife. Did it? Resolutely, she put the episode from her mind and hastened back to the Thurston box for the beginning of the opera’s last act.

Well satisfied with her few minutes” work, Clea sauntered into her own box and settled herself beside Jonathan.

“Any new gossip making the rounds, my love?” Jonathan asked idly as Clea put up a graceful hand to tuck in a stray curl.

She yawned. “It’s really too tiresome. No one is speaking of anything but that wretched book.
Town Bronze,
you know,” she answered in response to his questioning look.

“Ah,” replied Jonathan lightly. “I heard of it just this afternoon. Have you read it?”

“But of course.” Clea laughed her throaty chuckle. “I just said, everyone is talking about it. One must keep
au courant
with whatever is the latest rage.”

“And what did you think of it?”

Clea shrugged her lovely shoulders.

“Oh, it’s just what one would expect. A faradiddle, and nothing more, but it is fun to try to discern the various characters. It was easy to spot George Wendover, and Ceddy Bagshot, of course. I’m sure Lady Irongirth is Cornelia Wigand, but some of the others I’m not so sure of. I must say I’m a little disappointed.”

“What do you mean?” asked Jonathan, puzzled.

“I wonder why I am not portrayed in the book.”

Jonathan simply stared at her, at a loss.

“You cannot mean you would wish to be featured in such a work?”

“We-ell, after all, the most prominent personages in the Polite World seem to be in it.”

“Yes, but they are all—that is, doesn’t the author hold those people up to ridicule?”

“Only those who are ridiculous.” Clea smiled smugly. “Primrose Promise, for example, is portrayed as a sweet young thing to whom no one could take exception. If I appeared in the book, I’m sure it would be as a lady who simply enjoys her position in Society.”

She turned her head to watch the stage, and Jonathan stared at her as though he had never seen her before.

* * * *

A pale, thin moon had risen some hours later, when Tally and Jonathan set out together on yet another foray. This time Tally was to become acquainted with the interior of the taproom in Limmer’s Hotel, in St James’s Street, a favorite watering hole of military and sporting gentlemen.

Jonathan’s greeting was casual and bore, to Tally’s heightened senses, only a residual awkwardness from the incident of two nights ago.

Limmer’s was located near Mayfair, in an area of select gentlemen’s clubs, and might have been supposed to maintain some gentility in its standards. Tally found this to be far from the case, however, and after selling a few of her flowers, she found a settle near the kitchen door. Shaking out her grimy shawl, she tucked her skirts under her and began to work. Since this taproom was similar to others she had visited in the last few days, it took her very little time to sketch the essentials of the place. She was about to tuck her pencil and pad in her pocket, when she observed a tall man enter the room. Tally recognized him as Miles Crawshay, Clea’s cousin. With him was an unsavory person, short and squat, with a furtive manner. The two seated themselves not far from Tally’s perch.

Idly, Tally limned a swift drawing of the two with their heads bent together over mugs of ale. Suddenly, her fingers stilled as a fragment of their conversation was carried to her. It was the short, dark man who spoke, and Tally caught her breath in astonishment at his words.

“But what if Thurston won’t bite?”

“He is already quite besotted with the countess,” replied Crawshay. “I foresee no difficulty in....”

Here the voices of the two men dropped to a whisper, and Tally drew closer to them.

“My dear fellow,” Miles spoke with a sneering laugh, “believe me, Thurston finds her irresistible, as who would not?”

Once again the swarthy man uttered an expression of doubt. Crawshay’s reply was cut short as both men looked to the other side of the room where an altercation had broken out. Their attention returned immediately to their discussion, but now they were almost completely drowned out by the noise of battle.

In a far corner Jonathan searched frantically for Tally. Where was she for God’s sake? He had told her—she had promised to stay within his sight! There! There, busy in her corner and totally oblivious to the danger she was in. When he got his hand on her again, he would slowly, and with great care, strangle the infuriating little chit.

Tally saw Jonathan beckoning wildly to her, but was loath to leave before hearing more of the disturbing conversation she had stumbled upon. She edged even closer to the two men but was unable to hear anything more.

The melee had by now reached Homeric proportions, and Tally found that her path to the exit was blocked by two extremely large gentlemen, evidently bent on dismembering each other. Jonathan was nowhere to be seen. Fearfully, she scuttled around the end of the room, only to find herself facing a stout cudgel, held menacingly by yet another large combatant. Tally was not the hulk’s target, but he came perilously close to the gray wig as he swung his weapon in a wide arc.

She tried to move out of harm’s way but found herself hemmed in on all sides. Once more the infuriated fighter hefted the cudgel, and Tally shut her eyes tight and covered her head with both hands.

Suddenly, she was picked up bodily. She turned her head to find her nose inches from Jonathan’s, who with his free arm created a path toward the door. In a few moments they were outside, and Tally drew in great gulps of night air.

“Oh, thank you....” she began, but Jonathan was not listening. Gripping her arm he pulled her along the street, his expression grim, and when they reached the carriage he thrust her unceremoniously inside.

Eyes wide, Tally simply gaped at him. He turned to her and grasped her roughly by the shoulders. “You little idiot,” he began furiously. “Don’t you realize you could have been killed in there?”

“Yes, but—but—”

“You promised me,” he continued as though she had not spoken, “that you would remain close under my eye any time you were out in that unspeakable disguise of yours.”

“But, Jonathan—”

“This is the last time I will allow you to indulge in this—this lunacy- After this, you will confine your artistic efforts to Vauxhall Gardens or—or the maze at Hampton Court. I knew this was a flea-brained idea to start with, but you....”

Tally did not hear the fear behind Jonathan’s hoarsely spoken words, nor did she see the frantic concern evident in the blazing gray eyes. By now she was in a royal rage.

“What do you mean, ‘allow’?” she stormed. “You have nothing to say about where I go or what I do!”

“I told you it would be unwise to try me,” he grated. “If you cannot see that you are putting not only your reputation in jeopardy, but your safety as well, I will take steps to put a stop to your foolhardy activities.”

“And just how do you propose to do that? Lock me in the Thurston cellar?”

The idea is appealing, but I was thinking more along the lines of a large footman, complete with livery and brass buttons to dog your every step.”

“You wouldn’t!” gasped Tally, white-faced with fury. “Oh, I knew you were an arrogant bully!”

Jonathan pulled her close to him.

“
I
arrogant! You tell me that? You are the most…”

Tally gazed, transfixed, into the autumn smoke of his eyes, and the fire that leaped from their depths. Jonathan stopped suddenly, and with a startled intake of breath, bent his head. His mouth was hard and angry as it covered hers, and Tally experienced a shocked sensation of pure delight. The feeling was as new as it was pleasurable, and when Jonathan withdrew his lips, only to kiss her again, slowly and searchingly, Tally brought her arms about his neck without volition. She pressed her body against him as though she would melt into his very being.

Then, from the depths of her consciousness, sprang an appalling knowledge.

Chapter Fourteen

Tally sat at her little work table, gazing in consternation at the sunny garden outside her window. How could this have happened? How could she have been so stupid as to fall head over ears in love with a man who would never return her feelings?

Once more, she relived the kiss in the carriage the night before. Once more, she pictured Jonathan’s face when he had finally released her. He had been obviously appalled at his actions.

“I—I’m—please, forgive me, Tally. I don’t know what happened, there. I didn’t mean...”

Tally pulled away from him, and it felt as though she were peeling part of her flesh away. She held herself carefully, so that the misery that threatened to engulf her would not show in her face.

“There is nothing to forgive.” She was vaguely pleased that her voice gave no hint of the turmoil that raged within her. “It was merely the—the heat of the circumstances. Please, say no more about it.”

And he hadn’t. Not about that or anything else on the brief ride home. When they reached the corner of Half Moon and Curzon streets, which was their customary point of embarkation, Tally had slipped from the carriage with a whispered, “Good night.” Jonathan had reached out as though to touch her hand, but withdrew it quickly and bade her a muted farewell.

Obviously, thought Tally bitterly, the kiss that had been pure magic for her meant nothing more to Lord Chelmsford than a momentary whim, which he instantly regretted.

And why shouldn’t he? Her thoughts continued indignantly. What kind of a man becomes engaged to a diamond of the first water, and then goes around kissing persons with whom he is on the most platonic of terms. Particularly when those persons are covered with wrinkles and dust and a wig sliding down their nose.

And how was she to face him again, she wondered dismally. How does one greet a man who has just turned one’s life to ashes?

“Oh, good morning, my lord. Yes, it is a lovely day, isn’t it? Why, thank you I’m very well, except, of course, for this jagged crack in my heart through which my life’s blood seems to be oozing away down the street and into the gutter.”

Telling herself not to be absurd, she returned her attention to the illustration she was trying to complete. It featured a repentant Clifford and Clive in the Bow Street Magistrates’ Court, to where they had been unceremoniously hauled after a misspent night that had culminated in boxing the Watch.

Tally smiled to herself as she remembered the afternoon she had visited Bow Street under Jonathan’s watched auspices. It had been much easier for Granny Posey to creep unnoticed into those rather dingy Halls of Justice than it had for my lord Chelmsford, whose expression had swung from studied uninterest to one of unease that he might be mistaken for a pickpocket. So harassed had he looked at the end of her sketching session, that Tally had longed to reach up and smooth the lines from between his dark brows.

Now, stop that!

It would simply not do to dwell on Jonathan, and his smile, and his broad, muscled shoulders, and his….

No!

She would concentrate on her work, and—yes — on the endless round of social obligations in which she had suddenly been plunged. That was more like it. For the fact was that she had become a social success, and had she chosen, could have spent almost every hour of every day at some rout, or ridotto, or breakfast or soiree or any of the other functions the
ton
managed to pack into the few months when the beau monde was at large in town. Now, when she attended a ball, her card was nearly always filled, and Cat’s morning parlor always contained a full complement of smitten young dandies.

Tally had, to her astonishment, learned to flirt. With her new feathers had come an almost instinctive ability to send glances through her long, thick lashes to devastating effect, and to bestow wide, innocently provocative stares that one enamored swain had compared to “the spice-brown gaze of some shy forest nymph.”

Why, for heaven’s sake, could she not have fallen in love with one of those nice young men? Why had she lost her heart to a man who was in love with the most beautiful woman in London, possibly all of England? Jonathan’s adoration of his Clea was patent, and Tally could find nothing in herself with which to lure Jonathan away from that fascinating beauty.